Not drawing wax

[Worker bee]

Seems to be a lot of common issues in threads at present .... not a lot of thinking going on !
[/QUOTE

And you missed the joke......I must try harder

Oh I have a dry sence of humor that cuppeled with downsydrone

so I do tend to miss a lot of things

 

[Erichalfbee]

You have Downs?

 

[Worker bee]

You have Downs?

Yes runs in the family I'm quite capable of a coherent conversation though. Hope that doesn't effect my permission to post? I often tend to see people's comments as fact rather than humour until I work it out or read things that make no sense to me until I anilise them. I just think differently

 

[Woodland bees]

Think about what the bees actually want and need and work with them - think bees - don't follow the books and the calendar.

Whilst I agree with that, it's been hard to get the timing right this year with the extreme weather we've had.

I got the timing of adding supers in April right, but then the cold hit and the bees ate all their stored food. I was mulling over removing them and giving some food but took a gamble on the weather improving. In just three days they've half filled the brood box and supers with nectar.

 

[pargyle]

Whilst I agree with that, it's been hard to get the timing right this year with the extreme weather we've had.

I got the timing of adding supers in April right, but then the cold hit and the bees ate all their stored food. I was mulling over removing them and giving some food but took a gamble on the weather improving. In just three days they've half filled the brood box and supers with nectar.

Yes ... I've got one colony that I'm struggling to read at present - but there are some basics coming out in a number of threads that are clearly not being considered - the space/forage/colony size consideration is one of the things that is generally easy to get right if you think about it and causes so many problems when you get it wrong. The symptoms evident when you get the space wrong can be very confusing for new beekeepers and then, if you start manipulating for the wrong reason - it compounds the situation.

 

[Woodland bees]

My point is that this spring has been very hard to read and get right. I added an extra brood box on one as they needed it but that was just before May when the weather turned. I could not really predict 3 solid weeks of rain, frost and 70mph winds - even with a few years experience down here.

It doesn't help that the weather forecasts for where I live can be very inaccurate.

 

[mbc]

Bees that have decided to swarm are very reluctant wax makers until they've swarmed and build a new nest or the remainder until the new queen gets mated